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Wednesday, April 20, 2011

habitat

The count down has begun to new living arangements! When people ask why I don't sound more excited about this, it's mostly because I feel like I just bounced off a brick wall, and I'm laying on the ground wondering what just happened. I got a look at the apartment a few days ago, and discovered aqua carpeting. Not slap you silly aqua, but it's aqua, or sea glass, it's just really pale. And there's a brick - thank God it's not fake - wall adding some earthy richness in there. I thought maybe of a red or something, maybe a mustard... ugh, not with the carpet. So I found a picture of some plants in terra cotta pots (Bonus that the pots are pulling faces). I thought maybe of incorporating a grey into the room, maybe in the trim or something but then I remembered... the carpet! Yeah, it's not grey, but it's that silvery lamb's ear color, like the stuff growing in the middle, but the lightest parts. A color palatte generator spit off a very dark, muted teal as the darkest value in the strip. Which, for a basement with low ceiling clearance sounded a little, well, dark. Now, depending on how you look at it on the monitor, it's grey. Flat grey. Move around a little and it develops some personality. I have a friend who's living room is about #718264, but the ceiling in that room is at least 12' - great for him, since he's 6'4". I'm only 5'4", and I think my new celiling tops out at 8', maybe even 7 1/2. Can we say low clearance? So I looked at the value strip and saw my brick wall, #4D4B23 and #A89773, and the carpet (this is why I went for these plants) #A7D6A4... Which left me with a green and a ... is it teal? I would have said this was muted, but then I found the brightness toggle and discovered that no, these are the 'pure' shades'.

#718264 is just going to be too dark. I have a huge window on one side of the room that looks out on... trees. And the world's tiniest, sweetest patio with a stone retaining wall on one side. And #6DB05D? I have a shirt that color. I wear it with orange on St. Patrick's day. In a room that would get more sunlight, I would have picked that green. Like a focus wall in the kitchen or something. But what about the two together? Glidden's Sea Glass Green, GLG25? It's not the rock your socks off je-ne-sai-qua at my friend's place, but I'm considering a space less lofty. It also has some heft color-wise against the lambsear carpet.

I may, in fact, go a shade lighter, because it is pretty dark in there. Celery green, more in the pastel hue range and my first pick, just won't match the carpet. It would be insipid. So let's pull on the big girl shoes and pick a jewel tone. Or something in between. Oh. And then something that's not pure white for the trim and ceiling.

And then there's the bathroom. It's mostly tiled. And painted mustard yellow. Can we fix that? The mustard yellow part?